A Core's Revenge
by MadnessJones
Summary: There's a certain core in Aperture that holds a strong grudge against Chell for the events of Portal 1, and may finally get the chance to avenge itself. Takes place during the events of Portal 2.


I still remember the day that human ruined my life! I still remember the cool feeling of the lab and the chatter of my fellow cores as we watched the human named Chell run through the facility on the monitors in the room

Before she showed up I led a pretty simple life. It wasn't great, but it wasn't that bad either. Being attached to GLaDOS for 5 years straight was no picnic though, I'll admit. _She_ hated us constantly talking and giving her ideas and feelings. The one good aspect of my life as a part of GLaDOS was getting to know my fellow cores. They were my only friends, and sometimes it felt like we were a family.

I still remember Curiosity's endless questions. I'll admit it, they were pretty annoying. Sometimes I wished her voice box would break! Still, she was a sweet and innocent core who never hurt anybody.

Intelligence was the only core in our group that was decidedly male. I wasn't given a gender, but whatever I was, I knew Intelligence was special. He was kind of an apple polisher, however. He tried his best to make _her_ happy, so when he found out _she_ liked promising humans cake he started filling _her_ mind with random facts about cake. Over time he went corrupt. It was a wonder it didn't happen to any of the rest of us. His beautifully elegant facts were transformed into mindless dribble! Still, he stayed on the chassis. There were no humans left to repair or remove him.

Morality was...tired. That's the only way to describe it. She was built for only one purpose: to keep the humans alive by appealing to _her_ better nature. Of course, old GLaDOS doesn't have a better nature, so Morality failed. Eventually she stopped giving GLaDOS advice. Eventually she stopped speaking altogether. I can respect that. I don't believe in talking if you don't have anything to say.

When that human came in to kill GLaDOS, Morality jumped right off her access port! She wanted to die. She knew she had no purpose, and the deaths of all those humans weighed heavy on her processor. She just couldn't live with her failure anymore.

What Morality didn't realize, however, was that she doomed us all! We had been connected to GLaDOS for so long that we had become a vital part of _her_ systems! When the human saw that killing us damaged GLaDOS, then she decided to kill us all! It didn't matter to that stinking human that we were individuals with our own programming and our own desires! No! Just kill the useless cores! They don't matter! I hate humans so much!

Chell then grabbed poor little Curiosity and took her to the incinerator to join our dead comrade Morality. The poor fool was still asking questions! She had no idea what kind of monster had hold of her until it was too late! The core's screams sent shockwaves through my wretched metallic soul! I HATE HUMANS!

Then she took Intelligence! My poor dear friend! He might have been corrupt, but he wasn't beyond repair! At least he didn't seem to know what was happening to him. At least I can tell myself that…

That's when I knew...I was next. The Emotion Core. The only part of GLaDOS that could still be removed. I probably should have been afraid. I probably should have been sad for my friends. There were so many emotions to choose from, but only one truly fit what was in my heart...Anger! I HATE HUMANS!

I refused to speak to her just as she refused to speak to me! Part of me could even respect that there were no taunting words and no false reassurances, but that part was drowned out by my own snarling voice! I would haunt her nightmares if I had such power! The murderer!

I fell down the incinerator to be melted down like my friends. Of course, I couldn't even die correctly! Oh, no! I had to land right on a panel that was stuck in the wall!

I was badly damaged from the fall, but the nanobots inside my body eventually repaired me. Of course by then I knew. GLaDOS was dead, and the human likely got away. I HATE HUMANS SO MUCH!

* * *

Over the years I rotted. Days turned to years. Years turned to decades. I'm pretty sure a couple centuries passed with me just sitting in that hot incinerator room staring down at the boiling lava where my only friends had died so long ago. How I missed the babbling of Curiosity. The in-depth conversations with Morality. More than that, I missed intelligence giving us new facts or talking about the merits of using fish shaped waste in a cake recipe.

It took a few hundred years, but I think I decided that I want to be female. GLaDOS was female, and so was the human, so females are clearly more dangerous. Yeah...I'd be a real killer female! I hate the noises the incinerator makes. Every now and then I'll hear the screams of companion cubes or turrets screaming for their lives as they're melted down. The maintenance crews are slow, but at least they're still functional. Without GLaDOS around there isn't a lot stopping this place from exploding.

Wait, I hear something coming down the incinerator! Probably just another turret. No, wait! I don't believe it!

It's her! It's the human! She's in here! She's in my incinerator!

Oh, how I wish I could do something to attack her! How I wish I could push us both into the boiling pit below! Sadly, I can't. I'm up too high. She probably can't even hear me growl at her from up here. She probably can't even see me. My red optic looks like any normal turret's eye. I camouflage so well here...Lucky me!

She's grabbing an Aperture Science Two Way Handheld Portal Device. Seriously? Is she going back to testing? Are all humans crazy or just her?

* * *

Three days have passed since I saw the human. She got out of the incinerator safely. Crap. Uh oh, sounds like something's coming down chute 7 again. I hate chute 7! It's way too close to where I'm perched up here!

*Crash*

Huh...It's a monitor. It's about five feet away. It's spider-cracked, but otherwise it still looks functional. Well, it's not like I've had anything better to do for the past couple dozen decades. If I inch along the ground with my lower handle, then I can get to that monitor and see what's going on in the facility. Those monitors also act as cameras. It'll be like my own Snow White mirror!

* * *

Okay...That was exhausting. It took three hours to get to that stupid monitor! I hate not having legs! Okay, calm down, Emotion. You made it. You can see inside the facility now. So...Where do I want to see first? Hm...Maybe I could check on my old room; for nostalgia's sake.

I flip to the control room, and I see a surreal sight! There's a core in the chassis! Is that...Intelligence? Is that you? No! Get a grip, Emotion! He's dead! No...That's not Intelligence. That's his little brother, the Intelligence Dampening Sphere. Now I remember. Ugh! There were so many cores attached and detached from GLaDOS that I lost track after a while.

Yes, I remember this one now. I was never attached to GLaDOS at the same time as him, but I remember seeing him on the monitors as he tended to the relaxation vaults. I think he named himself Wheatley after seeing some wheat out a window one day. What a moron!

But wait! What is he doing in her body? Okay, what was that noise? Did he just moan like…? Eww! He activated the euphoria response code! I will _never_ get that image out of my processor!

Change the channel! _Change the channel!_

* * *

Well, I've checked on the maintenance crews. Still functioning. I've checked on the relaxation vaults. Wheatley killed everyone. Maybe he isn't so stupid after all. I still don't know how having this monitor is helping me, but at least I'm not quite so bored anymore.

One thing I noticed was that Chell is still in the facility. She's in the test chambers, but I noticed something else. The Intelligence Dampening Sphere isn't getting the good feelings from her testing anymore. This is great! He has her trapped like a bug in a jar and now that she's useless he'll get rid of her once and for all!

"Oh, by the way, I've got a _big_ surprise for you in a few chambers," Wheatley says to Chell, "Seriously, look forward to it."

What is he talking about? Is he going to kill her? I've got to know! What is he up to now? Okay, changing the channel back to the Central A.I. Chamber.

"Hm...What am I gonna do now?" He says as he thinks to himself, "I found the two new testing robots, so I don't need her anymore. Besides, her tests aren't working anymore! Is she doing it on purpose? Would she really make me suffer with this itch on purpose? Naw, she'd never do that. Just because she's bossy and inconsiderate doesn't mean she'd torture or kill me. We were friends. Hm...I said I'd surprise her, but how? What do I do with a useless human? Maybe I could give her my old job. She could watch all the dead humans like I used to have to do! Yeah! That would show her for not catching me back at the management rail!

"Then again, she did really want to escape. Should I just let her go? It was pretty rude of her to try to leave during my big triumphant moment, but then again she has done a lot of tests for me...Maybe I should just let her leave?"

What? _No_! Wheatley is the only one left in the facility with any control over the human! He's the only one left who can kill her! I have to get him to avenge our core brother and sisters! He's our only hope of ridding Aperture of that fat ugly menace! How can I reach him?

"Well, I could just kill her…" Wheatley said to himself, "I did set up those mashy spike plates and spiny death walls. Of course, those were for the testing robots. No, as bad as the lady can be sometimes, she would never kill me, so why should I kill her? She killed _her_ , to be fair, but _she_ was a maniac! _She_ deserved it! The lady would never kill a core that was keeping her alive and well-fed. She'd never hurt me."

Yes she would! She would! How do I make him see the truth!? I have to find a way to reach him before he makes the worst mistake of his life!

Wait...This is a monitor...It's a computer! It has the black box from GLaDOS and the last 2 minutes of her life! _My_ murder has been perfectly preserved in this recording! If I send it to him, then he'll know that the human has killed cores in the past! He'll see it, and he'll kill her first! It's perfect!

I reach my handle out to the buttons. It takes me several minutes to find the right one and send it to Wheatley. Working a computer without hands is really hard!

Yes...He's received the transmission...He's looking at it...He looks horrified by what he's witnessing! This is perfect! He sees the human for what she really is!

Go Wheatley go, you're our only hope…

* * *

 **A/N: Annnd...The rest of the game is history! I know this was a weird one, but I like to imagine the minor characters in alternate scenarios, and somehow I just thought this kind of story fit in with what little we know about the anger core. Hope you enjoyed this little ramble. Please rate and review :)**


End file.
